Best colors seem to be all black and all yellow, although I have a friend who swears by a yellow tail with a red body. The body is a rabbit strip, but it's cross-cut instead of the usual zonker style strips. This helps the hair to lay more naturally as the strip is palmered (i.e., swept towards the back).

Thank you Mark! The picture I saw looked as though the tail went all the way up to what appeard to be A thick palmerd coller. The fur looked as though it was perpendicular to the shank
I really appreciate your help. This Pike thing is all new to me.
Rick

About the hook? Iam using A tiemco 811 1/0. Now Inoticed the point is parallel to shank. Do you offset the point A little or does it make any difference. I know when I use plugs or quickfish,the hooks have to be singles. so i use Siawash hooks and offset the point jusr A little and it makes A big difference in hookups(Salmonoids).
Dutchman

Dutchman, You have a good question about offsetting the hook that I don't think I've seen discussed here or on any other fly fishing board. It's worthy of posting on either the main board or the gear board to solicit more answers.

Personally I've avoided using offset hooks on flys solely because they would be different to tie on. It's one area where I haven't experimented much, and probably should.

I did not take exception to your question. But I do really appreciate your concern in that regard. Thank you.
Now to the question. My intent is purely catch and release. From the responses to the thread,I keep getting the feeling that I am not expressing myself very well. I have never caught A Tiger Musky and wanted to know if I push the point out to one side a little would it improve my hook up ratio or is it even necessary. My understanding from your resonce is this will lead to fatal ingestion is that correct. They look to be magnificent fish and I would never do that just to improve my catch if it meant A potential fatality. I just don't see how that would happen. can you please help me understand this more clearly. As you can probably see I am one of those people who needs all the help he can get. Just for clearity I am fishing flys and not bait. Again i don't know if that makes A difference. I am really looking to your responce.

Dave,
I think that we've discussed the offset hook causing mortality on circle hooks. To recap for Dutchman, when bait fishing on circle hooks an offset point can cut the fish's gullet when the hook is pulled from the stomach and set in the jaw. From my memory I don't think we've ever discussed the mortality or or the hooking effectiveness of offset J hooks.

Targeting these aggressive species suggests strong wire hooks, yet doesn't require an offset in the hook profile. No, I do not mean to imply every hookset will result in potentailly fatal damage; it is my mistake that I presumed the question to be oriented toward bait, more so than artificials or flies.

I am in the process of tying a few pike flies. These are Marabou headed, with several hackle and schlappen body profile feathers, and some assorted flash. I am tying them on a 2/0 long-shank stainless, saltwater hook made by Varivas. This hook is standard flat profile, no offset, and has a rather wide gape between point and hook shank. The hook is in proportion to the materials size, and I expect it to hook if taken, based on the gape.

The general presumption is that an offset profile hook is used with bait, and intended to hook fish for the table. I'd love to be out pike fishing, too - hope you have good luck.

[EDIT] John, you beat me by minutes. I hadn't had a chance to read over between sessions. I didn't mean to cause the gentleman any concern, as noted above.

It is my question as to why use a j-style hook, with an offset, when a wider gape - essentially creating more to 'bite' on, accomplishes the same purpose, and the fish then almost hooks itself in it's mad thrash to tear the bait from the water. Remember, we're talking about a targeted species in this scenario. These babies aren't noted for being civilized.

Circle hooks are, in general, a flat-profile hook. Different manufacturers may say "circle" and have consumers think all hooks are created equal; it's far from the case. A flat profile circle hook will generally slide up from the gullet without catching on the way up. With any type of offset hook, the hook will turn.

I do a fair amount of pike fishing (flies) and on occasion, when I get back East, some muskie fishing(flies also). All of my flies are "flat". I use the Gamakatsu hooks (its the straight eye - with an semi open eye style ?? the correct name escapes me) because of their short shank, needle point and wide gap. Since these critters really attack a fly at the head, I find I get more and shallower hook ups, very seldom down deep, mostly on the jaw or lips. I tried long shank hooks and lost many more fish and had many more "deep throat" situations.
I have never tried the offset hooks but I do think this is a very informative topic and for all who are concerned with C&R, one that shoud get more "exploration". This forum can be the source of much experience on this topic, not only for pike & muskie, but for all species.
If anyone else out there has an opinion & experience on Flat Vs. Offsett, please share it with the rest of us.
In all of my tying years, hook selection has been one of the most crucial decision to a successfull pattern. AND I have changed hook selection to increase the ease of release with the result often being more "long releases" but overall more satisfaction and challenge in targeting a particular fish with a specific hook style that I know is more risky to me, but not to by fishy friends.

Wow guys this has been great !!! For someone who knows nothing about fishing for Tiger Musky,this has been great
I'm tying my Berry's Pike fly on A3/0 tiemco 811s. That is A stainless ring eye with A9/16 hook gap. Sounds like I really don't need to bend the point out. I also tied some Perch and Northern Pike minnow patterns on A Partridge hook called A Carrie Stevens. It is A 2/0 ten extra long streamer hook. It is three inches from the eye to the bend. It is A great lookig iron. I know she would be pleased. But now I am conserned over the remark about long hooks. I guess that is one of the things I'll have to sort out. Thank you everyone for your input.
Rick

When I said long shank, I didn't mean anything with a very extended length. This hook I described is 4X long, which isn't very much longer than a standard shank. If you have any Mustad 34007 in 1/0 or 2/0 (stainless) to compare against 34011, then you have an approximate comparison of what I'm describing in a Varivas 990S Salt versus 994S Salt.

Here is another mental picture: These hooks nestle very nicely inside a 35mm film canister with a little distance left to the cap.

Pete: the bouface I'm tying is tied about halfway back, leaving shank wound withthread, similar to a tarpon tie.

Regarding my hook selection. My reasoning for going to the 10xl is that last year when I was checking out this particular fishery,I had Achance to talk with the state fishery biologist who has been incharge of this project for about ten or twelve years. Tiger Musky were introduced to this res. to control the N. Pike Minnow/Squawfish. When they started the average size (squa.) was fourteen inches. they had just shocked the lake recently and the average size was nine inches. Now my thinking(yes I do that,just not very often) is, at least one of my patterns should should come close to that. Particularly in light of the fact they only eat once A day and like big baits. Is my understanding close here. Go ahead let me have it. I'm tough. The biologist show me what was left of one of those articulated plugs. Idon't know just how big it was origonaly but the front half was about three inches I guess. I couldn't tell for sure because when the fish hit it he took the whole back half off above the eye that held the two halves together. that plug was CRUSHED! I have been salivating all over mysef Just waiting for A chance at these guys. After reviewing this post, I may have to stop doing this at 4:00 a.m. Thaks again
Rick

Originally posted by Dutchman I also tied some Perch and Northern Pike minnow patterns on A Partridge hook called A Carrie Stevens.

Dutchman -- do you have a recipe for the Northern Pike pattern? I think that would be a good pattern here where they routinely stock some of the lakes with 9" pike and/or tiger muskies.

BTW, on two separate occasions I witnessed a larger pickerel attack a smaller pickerel that came unhooked right at shore. In both cases, the small pickerel sat motionless immediately after coming unhooked (the way they often do) and while it was sitting there the larger pickerel charged it, grabbed it by the middle of the body and backed out into deeper water to try to swallow its meal. I don't know if the feeding attempts were successful because the "food" wasn't much smaller than the attacker (about 2/3 the length). I have also caught a couple of scarred fish from pike-infested waters and the teeth marks were on the middle of the body. I'm not sure how much the feeding behavior of larger pike and tiger muskies differs from that of their smaller relatives, but these fish seem to target the area just behind the gills when attacking their prey. Perhaps that explains why FrenchCreek had better success with lip hooking the fish when using shorter shanked hooks, and tended to hook the fish deeper when using longer shanked hooks? This is just a guess based upon my observations and somewhat limited experience with catching pike and tiger muskies (I haven't caught any over 10# yet).

This marabou/hackle thing I'm doing measures between 6 and 8" max. The gape of the hook is somewhere in between 1/2" and 5/8" inclusive, if memory serves...it may be a bit wider.

I respectfully submit this idea: If a narrow gap, long shank streamer hook is used, how wide is the gap; where would the material tie-in begin or end, and where does the fisherman expect the fly to be attacked. I agree with Pete about lip or corner hooking, because these things tend to attack from oblique angles and then quickly turn away and toward the hiding place (my experience).

Here's a different way to ask the same thing.
1. Where would anyone of us position our materials, thus establishing the hook position for attack.
2. How much gape do we LIKE, visually, on a bare hook.
3. How much stuff are we tying in; how much gape are we eliminating with stuff.

Quentin, my answer to what patterns would someone tie for these guys is anything large enough to do the job, forage related or not, from old style streamer patterns right up to all the super flashy, super colorful salt patterns. If a Tarpon will grab something green, purple and yellow, a pike or muskie should be expected to grab a pink, orange or turquoise something or other...

By the way, this is all just mental gymnastics for me, and no measure of this is intended to start any flamefests or challenge anyone's intelligence. I'd love to tie up some outrageous color combinations and throw them at these guys.